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Steve Inskeep

@NPRinskeep

20 Oct

@NPR

Dr. Francis Collins, head of NIH and member of coronavirus task force, tells @NPR the group haven't met the president "in quite some time." The president instead hears from two members who are not experts in infectious diseases: VP Pence and Dr. Scott Atlas. The quote follows.

@NPR

"I think the president primarily is getting his information from the vice president, from Dr. Atlas. Obviously it's a bit of a chaotic time with the election...There's not a direct connection between the task force members and the president as there was a few months ago." @NPR

@MorningEdition

"This seems to be a different time with different priorities,” adds Dr. Collins on @MorningEdition. His National Institutes of Health is overseeing the testing of possible vaccines. Says four vaccines are in advanced testing; there is hope one will advance by the end of the year.

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Steve Inskeep

@NPRinskeep

12 Oct

"The Senate is doing its duty constitutionally," begins committee chairman Graham, who had publicly said on video that he would never try to confirm a justice in an election year, as he is now doing. "Our Democratic friends" will "have a chance to have their say."

Without mentioning his own prior commitments, Graham picks up on Mitch McConnell's argument that everything is different because the president is from his party.

"We've taken a different path at times - Bork, Thomas, Alito, Kavanaugh," Graham says. He urges Democrats not to attack Barrett the same way. "I think I know how the vote is going to come out," he says, predicting a fully partisan vote.

Read 56 tweets

Steve Inskeep

@NPRinskeep

11 Oct

@NPR

General Mark Milley, the president’s top military adviser, tells @NPR he is determined to keep the military out of politics. Milley expressed confidence the US election system will resolve any dispute that may arise in this fall’s election. @MorningEdition
npr.org/2020/10/11/922…

@NPR

Milley told @NPR that US troops are sworn to defend the Constitution and are willing to die for it—and that they are not sworn to defend any particular leader. His remarks largely echo what US military leaders have said, and done, for generations. But they come at a fraught time.

Some analysts have raised nightmare scenarios about election disputes. Milley said he’s confident the system will clearly establish who his civilian leader is—and the military will follow that leader within the law.

Read 5 tweets

Steve Inskeep

@NPRinskeep

30 Sep

It's really not sufficient to say that last night's debate was awful, though of course it was. The point of a debate is to compare the candidates for the job they're asking us to give them. And they differed pretty clearly on what they would do with the next four years.

Here is some of what Biden said he’d do with four years: Preserve and improve the ACA. Enact a public option. (Chris Wallace questioned him sharply on whether that public option would replace private insurance; Biden insisted it wouldn't.)

Biden said he opposes the Green New Deal but would invest in green energy. Said there will never be another coal fired power plant built in America. He talked of “ending the use of fossil fuels to generate electricity by 2035 and zero, none, emission of greenhouse gases by 2050.”

Read 10 tweets

Steve Inskeep

@NPRinskeep

27 Sep

“In 2018, for example, Mr. Trump announced in his disclosure that he had made at least $434.9 million. The tax records deliver a very different portrait of his bottom line: $47.4 million in losses.” nytimes.com/interactive/20…

“At Mar-a-Lago... new members starting in 2015 allowed him to pocket an additional $5 million a year... At his Doral golf resort... manufacturer GAF spent at least $1.5 million in 2018 even as its industry was lobbying the Trump administration to roll back... regulations.”

In other words, the tax documents show the president bringing in significant profits related to his position, while still reporting enormous losses.

Read 5 tweets

Steve Inskeep

@NPRinskeep

26 Sep

Watched the documentary "RBG" last night. It shows her 1993 confirmation hearing. GOP Senator Orrin Hatch is heard saying she is a "liberal" appointee of a "liberal" president, but that her qualifications are apparent. The GOP could have filibustered, but she was confirmed 96-3.

The scene illustrates a difference between 1993 and the Supreme Court fights of today. Partisanship evolved from being one factor in politics to being the sole factor. Officials once viewed themselves as having duties to the nation, separate from an above partisan interests.

In 2020, the president draws no such distinction. This is not an accusation; he's open about it. Anyone who separates duty from partisanship is branded a liar or a fool--such as Jeff Sessions, the attorney general who thought he owed a duty to his office and the Constitution.

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